Online gamers play at swapping gender

Millions of internet users are using computer games to perform virtual sex changes, according to new research.

A study of online gamers by psychologists at Nottingham Trent University found that a majority of them had switched gender while playing. The research, in which 125 players of complex computer games were questioned, found that women were more likely to switch their gender than men.

Up to 70% of female players said they chose to use male identities while inside internet games, where they are able to design their own characters with any race, gender or appearance. Zaheer Hussain, who co-authored the study, said that subjects gave many different reasons for masquerading as a member of the opposite sex.

"It seems that women gender swap for a variety of reasons, such as to avoid unsolicited male approaches on their female characters, or because they felt male characters were treated better by other males during the course of the game."

Although fewer men admitted to swapping gender than their female counterparts, the research found that switching was still practised by a majority of male players. Fifty four percent of men said that they had portrayed a female character online; a move they said allowed them to flirt with other players and explore a different side of their personality.

The study also offered more sobering statistics on the reasons why some people play games online, with 40% of respondents saying that playing games helped them to escape from troubling issues at home or at work. It also found that one in five players said they found it easier to socialise online than in real life.

Although they have been in existence since the early 1980s, online games have only turned into a major phenomenon with the spread of broadband internet access. As a result, virtual 3D environments have proved massively successful, with leading title World of Warcraft claiming more than 10 million paying subscribers around the globe.

"In these environments you can manipulate gender, ethnicity and even species," said co-author Professor Mark Griffiths, of the university's International Gambling Research Unit. "People do find it interesting to manipulate characteristics like gender to see what reaction they get."

"In our offline lives, there are set boundaries and limits – but these synthetic worlds allow people to explore aspects of their personalities that they couldn't otherwise do."

The paper, entitled Gender Swapping and Socialising in Cyberspace, is published in the latest edition of American journal Cyberpsychology and Behaviour.